2010 US Navy Conventional Submarine Idea...

[Zachstar]

One of my wishes for this subsim is the ability to construct virtual vessels that can span from realistic to pure fantasy and be able to take them into the heat of battle.

So assuming things will work towards a way to allow such (hopefully) I would like to get a little brainstorming going for a submarine class I feel our Navy is badly lacking in.

Super Quiet Conventional Combat Submarines of which classes such as the Kilo reside in.

The Kilo.. while being a somewhat aged design. Has proven how deadly these quiet beasts can be in a state of conflict. It is almost insanity that we have allowed ourselves to lag behind on this front when he have the science and industry to EASILY beat out the Kilo and even allied designs.

So to stir up a little thought here. Assume the next president knows this and convinces congress and the Navy to approve a program to develop a conventional submarine with 2010 tech and AIP for long stays under the waves if needed.

Discuss...

[Zachstar]

Obviously because you do not have a reactor behind you... Your range between charges is limited. Having the ability to go slow for days on a charge is great! However, the need to be able to sprint multiple times, attack, dodge, and escape taxes the resources of current battery technology greatly.

Thankfully there are several advancements in battery technology that ought to put the set on the Kilo to shame.

One is the extremely high performance batteries being developed for the auto industry. They are EXPENSIVE... but they ought to be able to give very good range that puts all others to shame by 2010.

The other is a radically new idea. It is not a battery but a supercapacitor. The one being developed for the ZENN motor company has the ability to charge EXTREMELY quickly with the right amount of current and beats out anything else when it comes to raw power output (It can discharge faster than just about anything can make use of) There is no chemical reaction here. It is pure energy being stored in tiny plates... Obviously the advantage of being able to charge very quickly and hold the charge for longer are key. A small problem is that over a period of a week or 2 without use.. they will slowly discharge on their own. Therefore travel will almost always happen on them.

With these advancements and others... The conventional submarine of the future ought to be cheaper yet even more deadly than ever before.

[Dr.Sid]

Those capacitors looks quite promising. For sub slow charging is no problem. But it will be revolution for PDAs, phones and pocket lasers :-D

[Zachstar]

Remember that the longer that the sub has to charge the longer it spends giving off much more noise and other detectable aspects.

If 99 percent of the output is being sponged up by the banks then you can run the engines at full power for a short time on full charge. Soon your banks will be charged up enough for a period of silent transit.

Remember these banks actually absorb the electrons. You are not converting one chemical to another here.

[Zachstar]

If that technology fails or costs too much there is this!

http://www.csiro.au/news/UltraBattery.html

“Previous tests show the UltraBattery has a life cycle that is at least four times longer and produces 50 per cent more power than conventional battery systems. It’s also about 70 per cent cheaper than the batteries currently used in HEVs,” he said.

[pingjockey]

You will never see a conventional American submarine. The advantages of having a propulsion system that does not require you refuel or stop to charge the batteries is worth the slight counterdetection threat. But that is just my personal opinion though. This is coming from a 13 yr sub veteran BTW

Pingjockey

[Molon Labe]

Conventional submarines simply don't fulfill any mission that is part of US maritime strategy. We have control of the sea, and our current strategy is to use that control to protect our interests and exert military power ashore. The submarine is an important platform in that strategy, from intelligence to special ops to strike warfare, in addition to the sub's traditional combattant role. But, in a time when the US is closing down military bases overseas rather than expanding to have more, mobility is a key attribute of any naval asset. Nuclear power allows our subs to get to just about anyplace in the world very quickly. Conventional subs can't do that. As SeaQueen once quipped, SSK's are essentially intelligent, mobile minefields. That's good for a state that wants to defend a small area, but it's not much good for USN requirements.

[pingjockey]

Well said and I fully agree

[baggygreen]

I don't know that the US will revert to SSKs, I can't see them needing them.

To control the litorrals, there is the LCS and the Virginia. SSKs are not much chop in blue water operations (with exceptions - and I assume Zach was talking about these possible exceptions). However, the way I see it is that if you can have a bluewater vessel which is perfectly capable of holding its own in the littorals, why diversify the fleet by adding a class which is great for littoral work, but nowhere near as great for the open ocean?

I'll go a step further though. Collins class boats are 'open water' SSKs. provided they can have regular refueling stops. Therein lies the weakness of the SSK over the SSN

[goldorak]

Well, the problem as I see it is that wether the propulsion is nuclear or conventional (like AIP systems) you are still constrained by supplies such as food.
What good is a nuclear sub than can travel x times around the globe nonstop when your crew has no more food ? :rolleyes:

[baggygreen]

True, but nuke boats tend to be significantly larger than SSKs, and so have significantly more space

[LoBlo]

May the theme of the thread should be "new conventinal submarine ideas" instead of just USNavy.

[baggygreen]

Well in that case, I've heard a rumour that the Collins boats replacement will be a conventional boat with VLS capability... niiice to get that modeled :)

[toni]

Brilliant idea to bring alive new submarine designs worldwide,but not just that I think.What do you tell me about putting at work the naval engineers developing new surface vessels? Assault ships and Carriers too would be quite interesting guys.

[Red Ocktober]

iwell... they're removing the flight engineers from planes... soon the pilots will become redundant as well...

subs are sure to follow this trend... autonomous unmanned submersibles will replace the current manned systems... and will probably (in most cases) accomplish the mission more effectively... and cheaper...

remove the crew... and you've removed that mission duration limitation mentioned above... and in doing so, you've effectively multiplied the mission capabilities of each unit...


as far as what they'll be propelled by... well, that's open to all sorts of speculation... so far, in spite of the promise that these new storage batteries hold, nothing has really come up to replace that lil atomic pile that can power a vessel for years on a single charge... at least nothing that has been disclosed to the public as of yet...


i'm sure something eventually will though... i mean, after all, these subs are really not nuclear powered subs... they're steam powered subs...

despite the impressive nuclear technology, we're still just boiling water...


at least the new battery technology moves us away from that age old mindset...


either way... the new subs will be more different than any of us can imagine...


... but hey, it's always fun to speculate :biggrin:


--Mike